The pressing surface that is the bottom of an iron has a shape with the front end portion pointed. Clothing is pressed by sliding the pressing surface toward the front end portion on clothing. Accordingly, wrinkles of the clothing are smoothed out. Further, the pointed front end portion of the pressing surface makes it easy to iron delicate portions, such as, around buttons of the clothing.
Ironing is performed in a limited area, such as an ironing board. In this case, the iron is repeatedly reciprocated, moving forward in a direction of the front end portion and moving backward in the opposite direction. The rear end portion of the pressing surface of common irons is not pointed. Accordingly, when the pressing surface slides backward on clothing, the clothing is wrinkled not being sufficiently pressed. The wrinkles made by an iron, as described above, are called return creases. It is difficult to smooth out the return creases. Meanwhile, ironing is efficiently performed by repeating reciprocation while moving the iron forward and backward. Therefore, it is necessary for a user to move the iron back with the rear end portion of the pressing surface spaced from the clothing, in order to prevent the return creases when moving the iron back. It is troublesome for the user to move the iron back.
Meanwhile, a cordless iron of which the iron body has no power cord has been proposed to facilitate ironing. The cordless iron includes a stand with a power cord and an iron body equipped with a heater for heating the pressing surface. When the iron body is placed on the stand, the power cord of the stand and the heater of the iron body are electrically connected. That is, the heater is supplied with power when the iron body is placed on the stand. A user separates the iron body with the pressing surface heated by the heater from the stand and performs ironing, using the remaining heat of the pressing surface. The temperature of the pressing surface gradually decreases during ironing. However, the user occasionally places back the iron body onto the stand to arrange the shape of clothing. In this state, the heater is supplied with power again and the pressing surface is heated. It is possible to perform ironing in the same way as the iron with a power cord, with the cordless iron, by performing the operation described above.
For example, an iron provided with a configuration that prevents wrinkles, in a cordless iron, is disclosed in Patent Document 1. FIG. 11 is a bottom view of an iron body of the cordless iron disclosed in JP-A-2009-28385. As shown in FIG. 11, pressing surface 101 has pointed front end portion 103 and rear end portion 102. Since rear end portion 102 is pointed, a return crease is difficult to be made, even though pressing surface 101 slides back on clothing.
In this configuration, since the cordless iron uses the remaining heat of pressing surface 101, when the thermal capacity of pressing surface 101 is small, the temperature of pressing surface 101 rapidly decreases during ironing. That is, it is difficult to achieve sufficient ironing. In particular, in a cordless iron equipped with a steam generator, drop in temperature is increased by vaporization heat of water. In this case, it is necessary for the user to frequently place the iron on the stand in order to ensure the temperature for ironing. The efficiency of ironing is reduced by frequently placing the iron body onto the stand. Therefore, it is necessary to increase the area of pressing surface 101 in a cordless iron. Accordingly, as shown in FIG. 11, rear end portion 102 is not so pointed, in the cordless iron of the related art. As the more pointed the rear end 102, the more difficult it is to generate return creases, in the cordless iron of the related art return creases are not sufficiently suppressed.
Further, the upper portion of rear end portion 102 of the cordless iron of the related art is covered with grip 104. Connection terminal 105 for power supply is disposed behind rear end portion 102. That is, rear end portion 102 is not seen because it is blocked by grip 104 or connection terminal 105. Therefore, it is inconvenient to use the iron when moving it back.
That is, it was difficult in a cordless iron of the related art to achieve both preventing return creases by making rear end portion 102 of pressing surface 101 pointed and decreasing a drop in temperature by ensuring a large thermal capacity by increasing the area of pressing surface 101. Further, it is difficult to see rear end portion 102 when moving the iron back.
PTL 1 Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 2009-28385